Sunday, July 04, 2010

rainy foodie saturday

Friday, the rain came down in sheets at lunch time and didn't really let up.

Saturday, we awoke to a light drizzle, which picked up and poured.

Satoshi had to go to Umeda for his German class, so I tagged along so that we could eat lunch together.

We decided to pick somewhere that wasn't too far from the station and not too far from his class.

The restaurant we chose for lunch served assorted Asian cuisine...Baku, in the Yodobashi Camera building.

Satoshi chose the Baku Ramen which came with gyoza...870 yen (about US$8.70). Satoshi really enjoyed this, though his gyoza looked a little overdone.

I chose the chilled Pho which came with summer roll...1030 yen (about US$10.30). This caught my eye because usually Pho is served hot. I gotta admit though this wasn't Pho...more like hiyashi chuuka (a Japanese cold noodle dish), which had rice noodles instead.

Even though it wasn't authentic Pho, it was still delicious, I loved the sesame sauce/soup.

The summer roll was also not authentic, it had avocado, some ham and veggies in there...different, but still hit the spot.After lunch, we wanted some coffee, so we went down a floor to the Sweets Museum, this is a food area with some restaurants and sweet shops.

After being seated at Dear Cafe, we looked at their menu and realized a cup of coffee would be 500 yen! (about US$5)....or we could get the cake set and pay 800 yen (about US$8), this would be 500 yen for coffee and 300 yen for cake.

We checked with the girl behind the counter and you could choose from whatever was in their showcase...So, we each chose the most expensive ones...worth about 480 yen (about US$4.80) each! (I guess we could look at it like we made about 180 yen (about US$1.80?? from the set)

I really enjoy reading your blog because you go to a variety of different places and you are an adventurous, experimental (well, to me) cook. I have a feeling you wouldn't be interested, but dare I say an English dining guide for the Osaka area might be a good idea? Is there one that you know of?

Kat, most of the Vietnamese restaurants in our area that serve pho also served cold vermicelli noodle bowls -- I wonder if that's what you had? They come with an assortment of grilled meats and crunchy fried spring rolls (cut into bit sized pieces) and crunchy veggies such as bean sprouts and julienned carrots. There is a bowl of cold "broth" on the side that contains fish sauce and other light ingredients, which you pour over the noodles. It's one of my favorites during the hot summer months, and my husband orders it during winter, too!

We could probably use a few rainstorms here and there, but I'm happy for the heat since it'll only mean tomatoes! Both your meals look so delicious....I feel myself going on another dumpling fixation...I saw goldfish-shaped dim sum in an asian food article and now I'm trying to figure out how to shape them!